Relationships and Domains › Relationships in the Physical Model › Specify Physical Properties for a Relationship

Specify Physical Properties for a Relationship

Use the General tab in the Relationships Editor in the physical model to specify the properties of a relationship such as its constraint name, cardinality, type, and null options.

Note: The options described are available for all relationships in a physical model. However, some target databases can have additional physical properties that you can specify. For more information about using these properties, see your vendor's SQL documentation.

To specify physical properties for a relationship

1. Click Relationships on the Model menu.

   The Relationships Editor opens.

2. Select a relationship in the Navigation Grid for which you want to specify properties and work with the following options:

   Foreign Key Constraint Name

   Lets you enter or edit the foreign key constraint name for the parent-to-child and child-to-parent relationship.

   Note: For Logical/Physical models, you can click the Reset button to inherit the constraint name from the logical name. If you delete the text from the Foreign Key Constraint Name field, the constraint name is set to an empty string.

   Parent

   Specifies the parent of the selected relationship. This column is read-only.

   Child

   Specifies the child of the selected relationship. This column is read-only.

   Physical Only

   Lets you specify whether or not the relationship should display in the physical model only. Select this check box if you want the relationship to appear in the physical model only. Clear this check box if you want the relationship to appear in both the physical and logical model. Physical-only relationships do not appear when you switch to the logical model, but the parent table's primary key still migrates as a foreign key to the child table.

   Generate

   Specifies to use the preferences selected in the Relationship Editor when DDL is generated during Forward Engineering. Select the check box to enable this option.

3. Work with the following options on the General tab:

   Type

   Specifies the type of the relationship. Select from the drop-down list; valid values are Identifying and Non-identifying.

   Null Option

   Specifies whether null values are allowed for non-identifying relationships.

   Physical Name

   Specifies the physical name of the object. This field appears only when you are working with a physical model. You can choose to inherit, override, or harden the name.

   Cardinality

   Lets you specify the cardinality for the relationship. Select one of the following options:

   Zero, One or More

   Specifies that each parent table is connected to zero, one, or more instances of the child table.

   One or More (P)

   Specifies that each parent table is connected to one or more instances of the child table.

   Zero or One (Z)

   Specifies that each parent table is connected to zero or one instance of the child table.

   Cardinality Value

   Specifies the exact number of child entity instances that each parent entity is connected to. Enter an integer.

4. Click Close.

   Physical properties are specified for the relationship and the Relationship Editor closes.

   Note: Other tasks you can perform in the Relationship Editor include entering a comment, defining rolenames for migrated keys, and defining referential integrity trigger actions.

More information:

Identifying Relationships in a Physical Model

Non-Identifying Relationships in the Physical Model

Set Relationship Cardinality

Set the Default Null Option for a Non-Identifying Relationship

Enter a Foreign Key Comment to a Relationship

Assign a Rolename to a Migrated Index

Define Referential Integrity Trigger Actions for Relationships

Assign Relationship UDP Values in a Physical Model